


In Love & War

by MiniPeridot



Category: Transformers: Prime
Genre: Angst, Asexual Relationship, Healing, If TF were gay Knockout would be, Injury Recovery, Mention of past trauma, Other, Shockwave's Past
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-24
Updated: 2020-07-01
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:20:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24896053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MiniPeridot/pseuds/MiniPeridot
Summary: A mix of canon and personal headcanons. This is what happens when you read a story about a character you love, but one or more parts of that story make you go... okay but what abooouutt…?
Relationships: Shockwave/OC
Comments: 1
Kudos: 7





	1. Love is Pain

Panic... Pure, unabashed panic.

My spark beats rapidly and irrationally with the pounding of my pedes against the metal floor.

In my chest, my spark constricts in extreme pain, and there's a pounding in my head that feels foreign to me.

Skidding into the med bay, I nearly fall over as I rush to the berth.

The medics try to hold me back, but they won't stop me. I need to see him.

My Endura's optics are open, but badly damaged as I take his servo into mine. His pain rings loud and clear across my own nervous system, bringing a new wave of pain to my spark.

The medics are talking about putting him under for surgery, a long crack cuts through his usually immaculate faceplate. The damage is severe. He can't even lift his servo to hold mine.

His spark seems weaker and there's a rasping sound coming from his vocals. He's trying to speak, but he can't.

I hold his servo to my faceplate as Energon and lubricant leak from my optics. "You're going to be okay. I'll be here when you wake. You're going to be okay."

I open my optics to meet his own, only one appears to still be functional as it attempts to focus on me.

There's an odd emptiness in my spark. Not the cold, loneliness of a bond being broken. It's something I've never felt before.

Wiping a few tears away, my vision is a bit clearer as I lean in to set my helm against his.

The medics start putting him into stasis for surgery and I whisper for only him to hear, " _I love you_."

That emptiness does not go away. As I pull back, my optics meet his one working one and a shake goes through me as a realization dawns in my processor.

The emptiness is coming from his very own optic. 

...No... from his spark.

My voice trembles as he loses consciousness. "Dear Primus... What have they _done_ to you?!"

——————————

The ground vibrates under a pair of treads, kicking up dust and rust in a small trail as a single bot races across the barren landscape.

This trip has been made a hundred times before; a still-visible line in the dust from the last time they came through this terrain.

The two-wheeler turns the front tire sharply to the right, the back tire skidding over the metal landscape with a slight screech. The rubber burns a little from the sharpness of the turn for a moment before the power of the still-spinning tread sends them flying forward in the new direction.

They approach a massive wall. It would appear to be a big wall of nothing to the untrained optic.

Triggering their access code, the hidden door opens with a groan, letting the two-wheeler zip into temporary darkness before the lights come on.

Odd. Those are supposed to be on all the time. Perhaps he's recharging in the back and decided to turn them off.

The tires screech as the small bot slams on their breaks, transforming to avoid damaging anything.

A set of relatively small pedes hit the metal floor and a femme looks around the open space with great confusion.

A table sits to the side and she passes it slowly, running a hand over the various medical tools.

Energon prod, cortical psychic patch, a medical-grade saw, cables for Energon transfusions, etc.

Each tool is laid out on the table immaculately, and arranged as he always has them. For lack of better words, the items are arranged by depth.

At one end sit the tools that function on the surface level. Drills, larger saws, Energon prod, and even the cortical psychic patch. As she walks down the line on the table, she approaches more delicate tools meant for detail work in or out of the body.

The saws give way to clamps and tongs. Further down, some small-scale welders and saws with much smaller blades for precise cutting, as well as a few other devices.

Her servo trails lazily over these items one by one as she moves down the line, adjusting one that was slightly out of line from its usual place. 

Reaching the end of the table, she looks around, wandering into the middle of the room. Turning her optics around, concern grows in her spark.

He would normally be out here by now.

Normally, his systems would have alerted him to the intrusion as soon as she entered, even with her code.

If he is powered down in the back, it would trigger an alarm. If he is in another part of the lab, he'd get an alert on a terminal screen...

Her spark beats ring loudly in her audios as her pedes pick up their pace. Poking in and out of hallways, he appears to have simply vanished. No signs of a fight, but nowhere in sight...

She enters another room, one with a massive, vertical tube in the middle. Her steps cease in an instant when she sees it's empty.

Nothing is broken, but it's completely empty. Even the fluid that had once filled it is no longer in the tank, but drained into other tanks in the floor.

The creature inside was released, not destroyed, but... where is it?

She makes a few more laps around the lab, checking the data terminals and his work logs. All signs pointed to things running as normal here until he just up and left, then returned not too long after to drain the tank and remove the creature from the lab.

But then... where is he now, and why didn't he call her?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I posted this on Wattpad like a week ago or something, but I got excited and started on chapter 2, so I'll post this here now too


	2. Love Can Cross the Stars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The same moments for the bulk of last chapter, but from a different bot's perspective.  
> I have included a list of terms that may be confusing to some readers at the end of the chapter. Let me know in the comments if there is any term I use that you are confused about. No shame. It is my first time using many of these terms myself

The keys beep softly under large digits. Long, complex calculations typed up along with theories to test later.

The walls of the lab block out enough sound to make work more efficient. Logical. The noise can be distracting on an instinctual level.

Work goes on. The war goes on. Once any endeavor has gained a following, a momentum, it will not stop. Not until it is concluded, or all those who drive it forward are eliminated. Even a single, determined survivor will continue the endeavor and rebuild. Such is the model of this war. If even one zealot remains among one of the armies, it will rebuild.

Every now and then, he runs some calculations and predictions about when, how or even if the war will end. Every time he does, his answer changes to some degree. Otherwise, he would not continue to make these calculations.

The door opens and a vehicon walks in. His optic turns to the drone and motions to the medical table. Vehicons have a limitation on their volition, but otherwise, their processors are about the same as any other bot on Cybertron.

\---------------***About an hour later***--------------

Energon stains the floor, the Vehicon lying offline on the berth.

The mech goes about cleaning his workspace, sending a typed message to Sounwave to send someone to clean up the mess on the berth.

Vehicons soon appear to remove their offline comrade. They pause upon seeing his state, but quickly go about their assigned task.

The mech at the computer, typing up notes watches them clean up his work.

_...Nothing… Once again… nothing… _

He goes about typing up his findings from today’s experiment.

As the vehicons are leaving though, something feels… off.

The mech runs a diagnostic.

_ Symptoms: _

_ Accelerated Energon flow, fuel lines constricting, spark beat is irregular, edges of vision are blurring… _

These are common symptoms for a number of emotions. None of them are good though… 

He looks around the room. The vehicons are dragging an offline comrade, who could’ve very well been them in this instance, out of his lab… No. The emotion can not be guilt, nor sadness. This is not the first time he’s done this same type of experiment, but it is the first one to have a delayed physical response.

The loss of this one drone will not impact the war effort, so it cannot be that…

_ Other symptoms?... _

_ Spark emits a particularly stronger pulse every 3rd pulse… _

Ahhh, it is not him who is reacting to something then. She is.

He runs over the symptoms again… She is afraid. In danger perhaps?

Finding no other explanation before him, the mech boots up a program he hasn’t used in a while. It displays notifications for his security system for his lab on Cybertron and has been triggered, but not the defenses.

A few taps and a smaller screen pops up, showing him the cameras for his lab. Flipping through them, he stops on one where a bot is visible.

Correction: where  _ she _ is visible.

…Odd… She does not appear to be in any immediate danger, nor does she appear frightened.

After some minutes of contemplation with no obvious answer, he closes the link to the cameras and walks out of his lab.

Vehicons and insecticons drift apart to let him pass, not wanting to anger him and end up on his lab table. Little do they know that their fear is completely illogical.

————

Heavy pedefalls can be heard from the hall before he even enters the bridge. When he does, Megatron, Starscream and several vehicons turn to him in confusion.

Megatron stares at him skeptically. “Shockwave? Do you have something to report?”

The one-eyed mech continues to approach his commander, undeterred by the stares in the room. “No, my liege. I came to request a space bridge transport to my lab on Cybertron. Immediately.”

At this, Megatron’s gaze hardens, his helm tipping upwards. “I see. Did you forget something there?”

Starscream looks between the two larger mechs warily, but this does not even register to Shockwave. “Not exactly, my liege. I have received an alert that someone is in my lab. Surveillance systems confirm it is one of our researchers I was working with on occasion. I realized I had not alerted them to my change of posting.”

Though his gaze becomes less hostile, Megatron does not appear convinced. “Powering the space bridge at this time would take away valuable Energon from our reserves. Could you not simply contact them through your lab’s com system?”

Megatron isn’t backing down, but neither will Shockwave. “With all due respect, this researcher may have information that would be of use in our current endeavor. They have studied the lore that surrounds it in depth. Their expertise and presence on the ship could expedite our work.”

There us a long stretch of silence until Megatron speaks again. “Very well. Provide Soundwave with the coordinates. If they have any research of use, ensure they bring it. We cannot afford to send someone back later for forgetting something. Am I understood?”

An edge is distinctly audible in Megatron’s voice at the end of his words, but Shockwave feels no threat to himself from them. With a nod, he walks over to Soundwave and arranges for the bridge to his lab as well as provides another location to reopen the bridge in an hour.

So, Shockwave finds himself walking through the open bridge a few moments later. His body is reacting again, but a bit differently…

_ Symptoms: _

_ Constricting fuel lines, spark beat rhythm has slowed with stronger pulses per beat, but is otherwise stable. Audio receptors seem to not be picking up sound in the lower range as well. Servos appear to be getting more Energon than they need, causing mild shaking.  _

_ Diagnosis… _

He forces his processor to focus as images of the femme he knows is waiting in his lab flash through his mind. It takes him a moment to realize his answer is apparent.

He is excited to see her. Some reactions are instinctual after a time.

He thinks for a moment.

_ No. Nothing at all. _

Logically though, he knows it doesn’t matter. His body still reacts now and then, though less so than it used to. Physical reactions are different from the chemical ones. Just because he can no longer feel anything, doesn’t mean his opinion of her, or anything else, has changed. Even without his emotions, the physical reactions occur on instinct as they always have, so he knows what he feels, even without feeling it anymore.

His spark still loves her, ergo,  _ he _ still loves her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone who likes Transformers but is not so familiar with the terminology:  
> Spark=heart but also carries the soul of a Cybertronian  
> Mech & Femme=Male & Female by mold (design)  
> Vehicon=drone-like Cybertronians who are artificial. Made to be mass numbers on the field. Quantity over quality  
> Insecticons=large, horsefly-like bug Cybertronians with a hive mindset. Physically powerful and always fight in groups  
> Fuel lines=blood vessels  
> Processor=brain  
> Pede/Pedes=Legs &/or feet, Servos=hands  
> Helm=the helmet over the head of a Cybertronian. Plays a big role in self-expression, like a preferred hairstyle would  
> Offline=dead (might be obvious, but maybe not known to everyone)


End file.
